Digital Branch of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Oral History Program

Vera Angasan

Vera Angasan was a Sugpiaq (Alutiiq) elder who was born at Ugashik, Alaska on October 4, 1924 to Joe and Anishia Kie. Vera was orphaned and raised by Pelagia and One-Arm Nick Melgenak in New Savonoski, Alaska. She married Trefon Angasan, Sr. and together they had ten children, whom they took to Kittiwik camp at the mouth of Brooks River to obtain their year's supply of redfish. They also used other parts of Katmai National Park to gather food for the year, from collecting seagull eggs to hunting moose and bear, to gathering plants, both for medicine and food. Eventually, Vera became the matriarch of the large Angasan family of South Naknek, Alaska, including mother to Ted Angasan, Sr. and Mary Jane Nielsen. Vera Angasan passed away on December 2, 2016 at the age of ninety-two in Anchorage, Alaska. For more about Vera, see her obituary in the Alaska Daily News newspaper.

Vera Angasan was interviewed on March 23, 1998 by Pat Partnow and Vera's daughter, Mary Jane Nielsen, at Vera's home in King Salmon, Alaska. In this interview,Vera remembers her own role as a child in the household of Pelagia and One-Arm Nick Melgenak, helping haul water and wood and helping with the late summer redfish harvesting. Her memories continue through her adulthood, when she and her husband, Trefon Angasan, Sr., took their ten children to Kittiwik camp at the mouth of Brooks River to obtain the year's supply of redfish, and used other parts of the park to gather food for the year, from seagull eggs to moose and bear. Vera also talks the uses of a number of plants, both for medicine and food. During much of the interview, she was looking through plant books to identify by English name the Alutiiq plants she was familiar with.